Oak Cliff Area Development

Blackwood Developments started construction late last year on a retail strip on West Davis at North Vernon Avenue. The new building will comprise about 11,000 square feet with space for shops and restaurants, plus about 54 parking spaces behind it.

Even Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings has called the Dallas Wave a “mistake,” echoing earlier comments from City Manager A.C. Gonzalez. Rawlings said he would vote for its removal unless repair costs came in at considerably less expense.

City officials have insisted for weeks that they don’t know what any option will cost. But Willis Winters, Park and Recreation director, said it could run as much as $3 million — or more — to remove the Dallas Wave, and that it could be less expensive to repair than to remove the feature.

The RFQ suggests it could — or should — cost half that much in a previously unmentioned estimate.

“The estimate for the partial or complete removal of the existing structures or bypass channel modifications is approximately $1,500,000 to $3,000,000,” says the document, “but it is the objective of the City of Dallas to meet the requirements of the project in the most cost-effective manner.”

School board president Eric Cowan agrees: Downtown’s an option. But only an option.

So, too, he said, is the old Adamson High School campus on Ninth Street and Beckley Avenue in Oak Cliff, which closed four years ago when students were moved into the $48 million replacement across the street. DISD had once hoped to raze the century-old campus.

But the school board recently set aside $10 million in the 2015 bond program for a transformation school, which would operate like a magnet but without the academic entry requirements. And Cowan, pointing to North Oak Cliff redevelopment, has long eyed Adamson as a potential site for one of those campuses.MORE

Construction on two major repair projects totaling about $353,000 are expected to begin soon at Kidd Springs Park.

The two projects will repair an enormous underground culvert, bring the dam up to Texas Commission on Environmental Quality standards and improve the shoreline around the pond.

The most expensive piece is repairing the giant culvert, which will cost $208,000, from 2006 bond funds.

There is limestone about 4-5 feet beneath the soil at Kidd Springs. Many decades ago, a drainage culvert 8 feet wide and 6 feet deep was cut into the limestone, and the culvert was capped with a 4-foot concrete arch. The City of Dallas discovered a few years ago that part of the arch had collapsed, and further investigation found that parts of the limestone walls had eroded.

That’s when the city erected that unsightly chain-link fencing just west of the pool; it’s been there for three years now as a precaution against potential sinkholes. But it will be removed later this year if all goes as planned. Work is expected to begin this month, and it could be completed in October.

The first section of the City of Dallas’ trail system to reach West Dallas also will be one of its prettiest.

The planned Chalk Hill Trail follows a 3.7-mile path originally cut by the Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe Railroad, from the DART station at Wright and Illinois and snakes around to West Davis and Chalk Hill Road. In fewer than four miles, it travels through varied scenery, including residential neighborhoods and forested areas, reaching the chalk cliffs above West Davis.

The trail will be 12 feet wide and paved with 6-inch reinforced concrete. Dallas County is paying $6 million for the trail, and the City of Dallas is paying $100,000 for environmental testing and remediation.

The city is expected to finalize its design for the trail next summer, and construction should being in winter 2017. It should take about a year to complete the trail, so it could be open sometime in 2018.

When it opens, there won’t be lighting or any other amenities along the trail. Fundraising from private “friends of” groups have paid for those extras on the Katy Trail and at White Rock Lake, for example.

Talks are underway to possibly hire Walker Parking Consultants for a consulting contract on the addition of an above ground parking garage at Bishop Arts Village. Details here. The linked document seems to suggest this structure would charge for parking. Previous discussions had only mentioned below grade parking that would be overparked by 30% with no charge for the public. No word yet on how the two are related.